Hechtsoft

So:

- Take courage, go ahead. No picking shoes first.

- Leave your comfort zone, your thinking. The comfort is beside the point.

'Meditation is like draining your ego from the bathtub that is your mind.'

- Sink into your Koan, don't try to figure it out. There is nothing to figure out.

Be fully in the practice. The analyzing mind here is nothing but hindrance.

Become a Mu idiot. It is so simple that it is hard to accept. It is perplexing.

Keep wondering, wondering is the key, it opens the mind.

- Who is reading this here now?

- Approach the darkness, welcome the unknown, embrace uncertainty,

lose yourself. When we see that absolutely all is uncertain then we will

live at ease. Then we can stay where we are and be comfortable or go

somewhere else and be comfortable. This is an antidote to decision

paralysis. Just pick one and things will work out. Pick the wrong one -

you can fix it later. (Ajahn Chah)

- Don't linger in sweet no-thing-ness and self-forgetfulness, move on.

- Enlightenment is not gradual, but a push through the obstraction, an

abrupt, complete break. And it is a process, an unfolding process, not a

state. When suffering becomes really felt, when we are desperate to free

ourselves from the human condition, then stunning things can happen.

Roshi John Daido Loori: "Zazen is the most essential aspect of the mind-to-

mind transmission. It is an incredibly powerful tool. It is not just sitting cross-

legged. It is not just meditation. There’s an incredible unfolding that takes

place in Zazen. It’s endless. It’s a precious gift that has come to us, that has

been handed down for two thousand five hundred years. Its simplicity can be

very deceiving. It is by far the most powerful thing any of us will ever

encounter in our lives. Don’t take it lightly. If you continue to do Zazen, it

doesn’t matter whether you practice at a center or study with a teacher. Even

the Zazen of the most rank beginner gives life to countless buddhas and

ancestors, past, present and future. Please don’t waste this gift."

Bodhin Kjolhede grew up in Michigan. He completed a B.A. in

psychology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor before

coming to the Rochester Zen Center. 1970 he devoted himself to

the Center full-time. In 1976 Kjolhede got ordained. He finished

his formal Koan-training under Roshi Philip Kapleau and began to

teach in 1983. In 1986 Kjolhede was appointed by Roshi Kapleau

as his Dharma-successor and since then he leads the Rochester

Zen Center.

In his Teishos you will appreciate wisdom and skillfull means.

Der Autor von "Three Pillars of Zen", Roshi Philip Kapleau, geboren in einer

Arbeiterfamilie in New Haven, Conneticut, arbeitete als Gerichtsreporter. 1945

wurde er Berichterstatter der Alliierten in den Nürnberger Hauptkriegs-

verbrecher-Prozessen. Im Anschluss daran berichtete er von den Tokioter

Kriegsverbrecher-Prozessen. Wikipedia: "Die Beschäftigung mit den

Gräueltaten des Zweiten Weltkriegs berührte ihn sehr und ließ eine tiefe

Spiritualität in ihm erwachen." Roshi Kapleau praktizierte 13 Jahre Zen in Japan

u.a. unter Yasutani Roshi. Er half, Zen-Buddhismus von Japan in den Westen zu

bringen. Roshi Kapleau gründete im Bundesstaat New York das Rochester Zen

Center. Angeschlossene Gruppen und Partner-Center sind in Madison, Chicago,

Cleveland, Mexico City, Stockholm, Berlin, Helsinki und Auckland.

Coming into this world we realize its limitations. Buddha Dharma, around 500

BC: Impermanence (anicca) is the first characteristic of existence - reality is

never static. All creations, all objects and emotions face change and

destruction, do decay. Causes and conditions are likewise impermanent (nicht

zu verwechseln mit der geplanten Obsoleszenz technischer Geräte).

Spiegel.de, 19.02.13 Higgs-Boson-Erkenntnisse: Physiker halten Universum

für instabil. - Ist der Fund des Higgs-Bosons eine schlechte Nachricht für unser

Universum? Physik-Theoretiker glauben, dass die Masse des Teilchens in

einem Bereich liegt, der dem Kosmos ein Verfallsdatum gibt.

In the end it becomes clear that there is nothing else other than present time,

ever-renewing, impermanence its permanent truth.

practitioner is to practice Zen with an attitude of single-minded urgency,

following a strong commitment. The way we understand and perceive

ourselves and our lives is an illusion, and through practice we can realize this.

There is no shortcut. It is strenous. The spiritual path goes through our

wounds, not around them or away from them - to go to church is easier. It is

rewarding, it transforms you, you will become conscious of delusions, of being

attached and clinging, you don't fall for peoples deceptions, you will purify

mind and karma. With regular Zen practice, mind is freed from restlessness,

from thought pollution, it gets trained in staying in the presence.

Buddhist writer Lewis Richmond: We suffer because we grasp after things

thinking they are fixed, substantial, real, and capable of being possessed by

ego. It is only when we can see through this illusion and open ourselves, in Ari

Goldfield's words, "to the reality of flux and fluidity", that we can relax into

clarity, compassion, and courage.

As John Pulleyn from the Rochester Zen Center puts it, the Zen practitioner's

approach to meditation and engagement is commitment to action without

clinging to results. - The benefits will cascade upon you year after year if you

persevere and stick with it.

Practice means searching to find our way back home to the original mind, the

True Mind. - There are two mistakes in practice - one is not starting, the other

is quitting.

This book 'The Three Pillars of zen' is the menu card. A

menu card does not satisfy hunger. If you are hungry for

the real meal, something beyond a cosmetic lifestyle, then

have the direct experience of the path by practitioning it -

stepping into a totally unknown world all alone. Zen

cannot be described ('not this, not that'), only

experienced. In terms of resolving the great matter

thoughts are useless, just dust blowing around in the

mind. Dogen: The failure of ordinary thought is that it pre-

forms all experience (Denken ist konstitutiv für die Welt),

it simply cannot allow that what is to be present as it is.

No verbal expressions correspond to this reality.

Being a Zen practitioner is not a matter of accepting a

belief system, a philosophy or a doctrine. To be a Zen